Topeka  Gov. Sam Brownback signed a budget bill into law Wednesday while at the same time ordering $97 million in allotment cuts, mostly through cuts to higher education and Medicaid funding.

Those cuts amount to an average 4 percent reduction for most state agencies, except K-12 education and public safety services.

But the governor accepted a proviso that lawmakers put into the budget that will force Kansas University and Kansas State University to shoulder a larger share of those cuts.

“Our economy continues to face challenges with declines in oil and gas production, agriculture and aviation, our three major industries,” Brownback said in a statement released to news outlets. “This budget recognizes those challenges while protecting K-12 education and public safety and finding government efficiencies that put more money back in the hands of working Kansans.”

For the Lawrence campus of KU, that means a $7 million cut from what had previously been approved for the upcoming fiscal year. K-State will take a $5.2 million cut. Those are both about 5.1 percent lower than what lawmakers had initially approved when they adopted a two-year budget during the 2015 legislative session.

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The KU Medical Center was also targeted for a $3.7 million cut, bringing the total cut for the KU system to $10.7 million.

Brownback also ordered a 4 percent cut in state funding, or $7 million, for community colleges, technical schools and Board of Regents operations, bringing the total cut for the entire higher education system to $30.7 million

“We have advocated all year for stable funding for higher education,” KU spokesman Tim Caboni said. “Unfortunately, this $30.7 million allotment represents another cut to higher education and disproportionately affects KU and K-State, despite the tremendous role they play in growing the Kansas economy. Given the magnitude of the $10.7 million reduction to KU, we will need a few days to carefully analyze its effects, which will be significant.”

The Board of Regents issued a statement after the governor’s announcement, noting that with the cuts announced Wednesday, state funding for higher education will be $100 million, or 8.6 percent less, than it was in the 2007-2008 academic year, the last year before the onset of the Great Recession.

Those cuts were announced on the same day KU officials asked the Board of Regents to approve a 4 percent increase in tuition rates. It was unclear Wednesday afternoon whether Brownback’s cuts would affect that request.

The Regents said that given the additional state funding cuts announced Wednesday, more adjustments will need to be made to the tuition requests made by KU and other universities before the board votes to approve them next month.

Senate Democratic Leader Anthony Hensley, of Topeka, said the higher education cuts “smack of political favoritism” because the language requiring KU and K-State to shoulder a larger share of the cuts was inserted at the request of Sen. Jacob LaTurner, R-Pittsburg, whose district includes Pittsburg State University.

“LaTurner and other Republicans are trying to protect their Regents institutions at the expense of KU and K-State, which as we know are represented by Democrats,” Hensley said.

Lawmakers assumed at the time they passed the budget bill that Brownback would need to find about $92 million in spending reductions, efficiencies or new revenues in order to leave the state with a positive balance at the end of the fiscal year.

But they also inserted a proviso shielding K-12 education from any of those cuts, knowing the adequacy of school funding is currently being litigated before the Kansas Supreme Court.

Brownback chose not to use his line-item veto authority on that proviso, and so focused most of the allotment cuts on the next two largest areas of state spending, higher education and Medicaid.

The Medicaid cuts will include a 4 percent reduction in reimbursement rates paid to doctors, clinics and other health care providers, but they will not apply to more than 90 hospitals designated as “critical access” facilities, which are smaller hospitals in rural areas that provide 24-hour emergency care services.

The Medicaid cuts also include a 4 percent reduction, or $7.2 million, in the profit margin of the three private insurance companies that operate the state’s managed care Medicaid program known as KanCare.

Budget Director Shawn Sullivan said the administration does not believe the lower reimbursement rates will result in Medicaid patients losing access to health care providers.

He said the three insurance companies will continue to maintain a network of providers that accept Medicaid payments so those patients will still have access to health care services within or near their communities.

Hensley, however, predicted the Medicaid cuts will cut off access to health care services for people enrolled in that program, which could put the state out of compliance with federal rules that say reimbursement rates have to be sufficient to give Medicaid patients reasonable access to services in or near their communities.

“The consequence of this will be that we’ll see a lawsuit which the state, no question in my mind, will lose,” he said.

Brownback did use his line-item veto authority to strike two other provisos lawmakers inserted into the budget.

One of those called for using about $16 million in tobacco settlement funds the state will receive next year to help repay, with interest, a $92.6 million payment into the state pension system that was delayed in April due to previous revenue shortfalls.

He also vetoed a proviso that would have required Medicaid patients seeking mental health treatment to undergo screening before they could be admitted to an inpatient psychiatric bed at a community hospital or residential treatment facility.

Sullivan said that provision could have violated federal regulations requiring equal treatment for mental health patients, and could have jeopardized federal Medicaid matching funds.

The governor accepted other provisos that prohibit him from taking action to privatize or outsource the operations of state mental hospitals in Osawatomie and Larned, or from contracting to demolish the Docking State Office Building, without full legislative approval.

Brownback noted the budget also provides increased funding in certain areas, including $5.6 million for the Osawatomie and Larned hospitals, mostly for pay increases for registered nurses and mental health technicians, and $1.1 million for the Department for Children and Families to fund pay increases for social workers.

Hey, the Republicans in Topeka threw up their hands and told him to fix the budget, and he did. The man does not care how hated he is. And Kansas has two more Brownback budgets to go before Kobach is governor in 2018 (just kidding, kind of)

Steve, don't laugh. I'll tell you who is laughing. The people of Kansas. Every single thing Brownback is doing (and every single thing Kobach will do) is exactly what the people of Kansas voted him in to do.
1. Stop all education. Education is the enemy of religion.
2. Stop all abortions, and all birth-control methods, including the pill, IUD's, and even condoms..
Kobach will be elected in a landslide. Kansas is more religious-intolerant than ISIS and the Taliban combined.

I believe that will happen as soon as there are no more programs to cut. You would think that what 12 out of the past 13 months revenue has not met expectations would be enough to start some sort of proceedings, but not Kansans just keep hoping that next month it will be alright.

Another HUGE one yet to come. Once the Kansas Supreme Court comes out on June 1st with their ruling against the State on school financing Browncrack will have to slash even more before the start of the fiscal year on July 1.

What the GOP seems to saying is that allowing a handful of transgender people to use the bathroom they identify with will wreck public education, but millions of dollars of cuts to funding will be just fine.

Oh, and the agriculture business is important, but not important enough allow cheap wind energy to replace the climate change causing coal plants.

What is he going to cut next month when taxes fail to meet expectations AGAIN? This guy just won't give up. Until he is the only guy being paid in the entire state because there isn't any money to pay or do anything, or anyone else. The voters of Kansas must be a very tolerant bunch, as they haven't recalled his worthless A^^ yet. I guess they are just used to getting screwed, and now they don't want it to stop.

And there you go. He's following the same playbook that Jindal used to destroy my home state. Before he's done, higher education, as happened here in Louisiana, will be a sad shell of its former self. I could see this coming from a mile away. Kansas voters don't see what's happening here?

So let me get this right, because KU and K-State are "rich" schools they can afford to pay a little extra into the kitty so that the "poor" schools don't have to kill themselves and cut their already small budgets. But if we were talking about paying individual taxes we are to believe the opposite is true.

I have real issues with the exorbitant economy of college sports, but I have to say that it's not Bill Self's fault that he has this tax advantage. I've heard lots of "sole proprietors" at various income levels say that they have no intention of adding jobs to their LLCs. Some have even posted on the LJW blogs. The tax cut legislation was poorly conceived. If and when there is a possibiliy to modify or remove this legislation, it should be done. Governor is in the awkward position between admitting hie error or charging full speed ahead.

Actually, is not mentally incompetent, he is just evil. He pretends to be a good little Christian, but in fact he worships GREED. He is a puppet of those who think that if something isn't making a monetary profit, it's evil.

So is our state government. You don't think he has built a reputation among the anointed as a "Christian"? You can actually say out loud that he has not built his political agenda, at least publicly, around "Christian" values? Family structure, sexual agenda, that kind of thing?

If not, you have not been paying attention, like the majority of people who actually voted the last two rounds.

please help a disabled veteran about to lose his home after his wife lost her battle to colon cancer and veteran son (bronze medal in Iraq) and between medical and funeral bills might lose everything he has left www.gofundme.com/robertstreich

He was voted in for another term, can't he be removed by the same people? Just think his name was mentioned as a possible candidate for the GOP. Maybe he still thinks his "experiment" was a good thing and trump will choose him as a running mate.

For Christ sake, HOW in the heck did a state full of smart people fall for this guy twice?! NOTHING did he promise came to fruition and he continues to run a state that was doing amazing things off a cliff. Can't you guys just recall him? Can't the GOP controlled House and Senate just start unwinding his disastrous tax polices. It's stupid to keep filling up the bathtub by carrying buckets of water from the kitchen sink. Just use the bathtub faucet. Jesus Kansas, I live in Arkansas and I feel sorry for you. Let that wash over you a sec.

so how high will the sales tax on the poor and working class go up before the remove the master of brownbackastan?the rich being supported by everyone else wont go on to much longer.no school for your kids no work no roads .how long ?

It's hard for me to feel bad for Kansas when THEY elected this idiot knowing who he was. They wanted this guy to be their governor. What did Kansas think would happen when they elected this clown? Look who's talking... I live in NC with tax happy Pat McCrory... but he won't tax the wealthy... just the middle class and the poor.

Don't place all the blame on the incompetent Governor. The legislature left town without a balanced budget which violates the state constitution. Oh well, they don't have enough room in Lansing or Topeka to house the lawbreakers. It's time for new leadership in Topeka!!
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Sullivan has got to be kidding. So, those who receive Medicaid benefits will still get critical care access, which may or may not include any specialty care. So if that is needed and they have to obtain services outside their medical home, they can search for an independent practitioner who may or may not take any more Medicaid clients. Most practitioners outside rural critical access units cap percentage of Medicaid clients so they can make a living. This also doesn't promote preventative care very well. Just my opinion.